On Thursday, the Home Office revealed in its latest statistics, that Indian students and skilled professionals got the highest number of UK visas in 2018.

Indian professionals which include software engineer and doctors have been dominant in the UK Tier2 skilled visa for several years and thus account for 54% of such visa issued in 2018.

In the Home Office’s latest analysis, Indian citizens had increased by 6% (3,023 more visas) in the grant of Tier 2 visas; being the highest when compared to the statistics of the previous year.

The analysis also showed that last year recorded a tremendous increase by 35% in the number of student visas given to Indians, bringing it to a total of 19,505. The Chinese students still dominated this category with a lead of 99,723 student visas, but this is only a 13% increase from the former record.

For the tourist visas, the Chinese citizens remained in the lead with 55,095 visas, an 11% increase than the year before, while Indian citizens received 43,771 visas, raising the value by 10% when compared to the year before.

The Home office noted that both Chinese and Indian citizens accounted for 48% of all visitor visas granted in 2018.

The Trend so far

The continuous trend of a hike in the number of non-EU immigrants arriving in the UK is being witnessed in the 2018 data. This contrast the decrease in immigration of EU nationals to the UK as 29 March – deadline for Brexit – draws closer.

From the revealed figures, it is seen that the number of non-EU nationals like Indians coming to the UK has increased by 261,000 and this is the highest figure since 2004. However, net immigration from EU countries continued to dwindle to a level that was witnessed in 2009.

The Director of the Center for International Migration at the UK’s Office of National Statistics (ONS), Jay Lindop said that since the EU referendum votes took place in 2016, different patterns of the migration of EU and non-EU citizens have been witnessed. Adding, she said that the net migration of non-EU arriving in the UK for study and work had been the highest number witnessed since 2004.

However, when the net migration of EU nationals is being compared, even though it adds to the entire population, a significant fall as was last witnessed in 2009 is seen. What is now being seen is EU8 citizens leaving the UK instead of arriving, said Lindop.

Also, there is a decrease in the migration of citizens from Central and Eastern European countries like Poland, Lithuania and Slovakia referred to as EU8 countries, to the UK. Instead, they are seen leaving the country.

The Office of National Statistics (ONS) said that the overall figures of Immigration, emigration and the net migration have been stable, broadly, since the end of 2016.

From that year to 2018 September, annual net immigration of 283,000 is seen, resulting from the Immigration of 627,000 individuals to the UK and the emigration of 345,000 people from the UK.

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